Night and day, and through wind and storm, she had travelled the hills, healing the sick and laying out and helping to bury the dead. Apparently there was not a man, woman, or child in Happy Valley who did not love her or have some reason to be grateful, and when in the open-air meeting-house Parson Small told of her work and prayed that her life be spared, there were fervent "Amens," or tears and sobs, from all. Doctor Jim soon found himself getting deeply interested in the people, and when he contrasted the lives of those whom the influence of the Mission school had not yet reached with the folks in Happy Valley he began to realize the amazing good that St. Hilda was doing in the hills. What a place he was earning for himself he was yet to learn, but through some mystification an inkling came. To be sure, everybody spoke to him as though he were a fixture in the land. He could pass no door that somebody did not ask him to come in and rest a spell, or stay all night. He never went by the mill that Aunt Jane did not have a glass of buttermilk for him and Uncle Jerry did not try to entice him in for a talk. Several times the little judge of Happy Valley had ridden down to ask after Juno and to talk with him. Pleasant Trouble waved his crutch from a hillside and shouted himself at Doctor Jim's disposal for any purpose whatever. But one sunset he had stopped at Lum Chapman's blacksmith-shop just as a big, black-haired fellow, with a pistol buckled around him, was reeling away. The men greeted him rather solemnly, and he felt that they wanted to say something to him, but no one spoke. He saw Jay Dawn nod curtly to Pleasant Trouble, who got briskly up and walked up the road with him until they were in sight of Juno's home. For three days thereafter Pleasant was waiting for him at the shop and walked the same space with him. The next day Jay Dawn spoke with some embarrassment to him: "Have you got a gun?" "No." Jay handed forth one. "Oh, no!" said Doctor Jim. "Go on!" said Jay shortly; "I got another un." "But why do I need a gun?" Jay was distinctly embarrassed. "Well," he drawled, "thar's some purty bad fellers 'bout hyeh, an' when they gits drunk they might do somethin'. Now that Jerry Lipps you seed hyeh t'other day a-staggerin' off drunk--he's bad. An' you do a heap o' travellin' alone. This ain't fer you to kill nobody but jus' kind o' to pertect yerself." "All right," laughed Doctor Jim. "I couldn't hit a barn--" but to humor Jay he took the weapon, and this time Pleasant Trouble did not walk home with him. Later he mentioned the matter to St. Hilda, who looked very grave. "Yes, Jerry Lipps is a bad man. He's just out of the penitentiary. Pleasant walked home with you to protect you from him. They won't let him do anything to you openly. And Jay gave you that gun in case he should attack you when nobody was around." "But what has the fellow got against me?" The teacher hesitated.